USA > Oregon > Multnomah County > Portland > History of Portland, Oregon : with illustrations and biographical sketches of prominent citizens and pioneers > Part 25
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The development of the railways of Portland is that of the State. There was practically nothing accomplished for our roads outside of Portland, or without Portland men. True, it is not to be forgotten that there was a considerable number of representative men of other sections who entered with lively interest into encouraging railroads, and became identified with the first enterprise. J. S. Smith and I. R. Moores, of Salem; T. R. Cornelius, of Washington County; Robert Kinney, of Yamhill; and General Joel Palmer, of the same; Colonel J. W. Nesmith, of Polk; Judge F. A. Chenoweth, of Benton; Stukeley Ellsworth and B. J. Pengra, of Lane, and Jesse Applegate, of Douglas, were among this number. Other names might be added. They were active in interesting the people of their several localities in the construction of railroads and withont their aid difficulties would have multiplied. The very first movements toward a road- in 1863-moreover, came from California, with Elliott and Barry. The most radical and active mover was first a citizen of Jacksonville, in Southern Oregon. Quite a considerable portion of the first impetus came from the desire to have direct communication with San Francisco, so that the people of Southern Oregon and the upper Willamette Valley need not be obliged to make a circuitous route through Portland, or sell and buy in her market and pay tolls on passing up and down the lower Columbia and Willamette. The
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Californians first agitating the project certainly had no aim other than to extend the tributary region of San Francisco. But with all this in view it still remains the fact that it was upon Portland that all the railway activity centered and she proved to be the only point from which to operate successfully. We are therefore justified in speaking of the railway development of Portland as that of the State, and dating the nativity of her lines from the first efforts in 1863. Whoever accomplished much in the business had to become Port- landers.
The story of our first railroads is interesting, romantic and dramatic. One is astonished at the intense earnestness, the violent contentions, the lurid combats, the savagery, the cunning, the bluster and the ludicrous or pathetic denouements. There are situations of the inost amazing oddity; old and hitherto most amiable and dignified citizens of our State finding themselves perked in hyperbolical inversion before a gaping and mystified public, who were in doubt whether to break into a guffaw or to look with feigned nonchalance upon what they supposed must be a new era in inorals introduced with a railroad age. What with plethoric promises of lands quadrupled in value, of produce doubled, and visions of the wealth of Aladin, and an inner feeling of the heart that the old order of toil and honesty was somehow to be superceded by an age of gigantic speculations in which wealth by the millions was to be created by corporate fiat, and the fundamental rules of arithmetic and of ancient law were to be transmitted into something easier if not better, our railroad building introduced a time at once amusing and pathetic, as well as pecuniarily progressive. The former phase of the subject must, however, be left to the student of human nature, or to the homilist. Like all great changes in the habits and outlook of the people, it was accompanied by an excitation of much ambition, rivalry, passion, and at length a general cloud burst of indignation and censure; but worked its way through to a beneficent result.
To begin with a somewhat bare account of all this, we find that in 1863 there was a Californian toiling up from the land of gold and droughts, through the valleys of the Sacramento and Shasta, with a surveying party, to run a line for a railroad from the
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Sacramento to the Columbia river. This was Simon G. Elliott, of Marysville, who had but recently been listening to the expositions, prophecies and demonstrations of Judah, the first preacher in California of the Pacific railway. In the spring he had been in Eugene City, Oregon, and there interested Mr. George H. Belden, formerly of Portland, in his enterprise, and during the season of '63 the two were running the level, chain and transit from Red Bluff, California, to Jacksonville, in Oregon. There were twelve men in the surveying party, and accompanying it as general superintendent was Colonel Charles Barry, recently from the seat of civil war then raging, having resigned from the army on account of a wound received in the battle of Shiloh. This was purely an autonomous party, without legal father or mother or sponsor capitalists; spying ont a railroad path for its own satisfaction, and having no means of subsistence except from contributions on the way. The land, althoughi rugged and but sparsely populated, was sufficient to feed them, and the settlers along the route listened with awe to their stories of iron wheels that were soon to roll in their foot tracks.
In November they went into winter quarters at Jacksonville, Elliott and Belden separating on account of the delicate question of priority of leadership the rest of the way; the former going to San Francisco and the latter coming to Portland. Colonel Barry, however, staid by the party. At Jacksonville was added the inost important member to the company. This was Joseph Gaston, Esq., now of Gaston, Washington County, and of Portland, Oregon, and the present editor of the Pacific Farmer. He was then editor of the Jacksonville Times. Gaston went to work with the enterprise and enthusiasın of an Achilles, and while the baker's dozen of autonomous surveyors were boarding themselves in the old hospital at Jacksonville, went about collecting means to enable them to continue the work the next summer. He was successful, and in May following, level, transit and chain were again set in motion. In September, Barry's party was at Portland, having made measurements and memoranda the whole distance from Red Bluff, California, to the public levee in our city, on which they were camped. The people on the way had been startled into life by the apparition, and the State groaning like
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the rest of the Union under the evils of the great war, and not yet well knowing whether there was still a nation, was aroused by this practical exhibition of faith in the future of the country and deter- inination to be ready for the great national development just so soon as the Union was once inore compacted.
Colonel Barry prepared a report of thirty-three pages, addressed to the "Directors of the California and Columbia River Railway Company;" not, however, designating the members of this company by name. His pamphlet discussed the subject of routes, and summarized the findings of the surveyors. As illustrating by what ineans bills were paid at this stage of the work, it may be mentioned that the pamphlet was published from the office of the Salem Statesman, and the work paid for by editorial services on the paper by Mr. Joseph Gaston.
Being in reality an address to the people of Oregon, it was admirably framed to excite interest in a general movement toward opening the State by rapid transit. As to routes, Colonel Barry reported that there were two from Jacksonville across the Umpqua mountains; one by Grave Creek, a rugged and difficult region, with a grade of 100 feet per mile; and a second by Trail Creek, which lie had only partially examined, but thought would prove better. Through the Umpqua Valley lie reported an easy way between the imultitude of hills, with grade not exceeding eighty feet. He preferred the Applegate Pass of the Calipooialis to that by Pass Creek, and spoke with enthusiasmn of the facility of construction down the Willamette Valley. To reach the Columbia river, he preferred a route to the Scappoose Mountains and through them by the Cornelius Pass to St. Helens, but recognized the advantage of making Portland the terminus. He named the passes of the Portland hills available as at the falls of the Willamette, by Sucker Lake and Oswego, and by the Cornelius Pass below the city. He also spoke of the impossi- bility of accommodating the whole of the Willamette Valley by one road. By pretty careful and just estimates, he set the total cost of con- structiug the entire line at $30,000,000, and the net annual earnings of the road from Marysville to the Columbia at $5, 600, 000. The report was flattering, presented in a pleasing for, and had a remarkable
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air of ease and assurance. He accorded especial praise to Mr. Gaston for valuable assistance and possession of scientific attainments and thorough knowledge of railroad enterprises. Accompanying this report was a description-prepared by Mr. Gaston-of the region traversed, and of Oregon in general. It was the first of the kind ever attempted-exact and concise.
The next step was to get the subject before the Legislative bodies. It was brought by Mr. Gaston in 1864 to the attention of the Oregon Legislature, and a bill was passed at that session to grant $250,000 to a company constructing a road from Portland to Eugene; but this sum was so comparatively small as to induce no capitalists to take advantage of the offer. In the same year Colonel Barry went to Washington City and laid the matter before the United States Congress. He was warmly supported by Congressman Cornelius Cole, and General Bidwell, of California, and by the entire Oregon dele- gation-Senators Williams and Nesmith, and Congressman McBride. A bill was prepared and pushed through the House by Bidwell; by Nesmith, in the Senate. An important provision had already been suggested by Colonel W. W. Chapman, of Portland. When the surveyors first reached Engene they called a meeting of the citizens to ratify their undertaking. Colonel Chapman happening to be present at Engene on business, attended their meeting. When å resolution was brought forward to embody the sentiment of those present, he noticed no reference as to the place of beginning to build the road except at Marysville in California, and seeing at once that a road if this built would draw trade towards San Francisco during its whole process of construction, and might not be at all completed to Portland, he added the provision that the road be begun at the two termini, Portland and Marysville; that the two roads thus constructed should connect near the California border; that they be constructed by two companies, a California and an Oregon, each acting under the laws of their respective States; and that neither should ever discriminate against the other in freights or fares. These provisions were embodied in the bill of Bidwell, which also provided a land grant to the amount of twenty alternate sections, or 12,800 acres per mile, aggregating some 7,000,000 acres, worth about
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$5,000,000 at the time-now worth at least $30,000,000. Upon completion and equipment of the first twenty miles of road and telegraph line within two years, the land grant co-terminus was to be patented to the railroad companies; the road twenty miles further was to be built each year, and the whole to be completed by 1875.
The point of value in the bill was its land grant. Opposition to the giving of the public domain to corporations had not yet developed, and the subsidy worth $5,000,000 at the least was sufficient to induce capitalists to lend money on a work costing not more than $30,000,000. Great stress was laid in arguing for the bill on the fact that the Pacific sea-board was open to the attacks of a foreign enemy, and that to make the Union and Central Pacific railways effective in repelling invasion there should be a rail line parallel to the coast to allow the speedy dispatch of troops to any point threatened. As our relations with Great Britian were not very friendly in 1866, and France and Spain were also held as invidious, this reasoning had weight with eastern statesmen. Bankers seeking investments for the bonds and notes they held of the Government were readily led to look into the merits of such a road as that proposed.
The point of difficulty was to get means to build and equip the first twenty miles. While the matter of $15,000,000 looked indescribably easy as it rolled off Colonel Barry's facile pen, thie matter of securing $40,000 in Oregon in '68 was a lierculean task The most of the farmers thought they were doing well if they could produce one hundred dollars on demand. Of the financial struggle, however, some account will appear later.
At the time of the passage of the bill by the United States Congress, in 1866, there was a company in California, already in existence, which was designated in the bill as the California and Oregon Railroad Company. But in Oregon no company had as yet been formed. The singular situation was therefore seen of a land grant of some 5,000,000 acres to a company not yet in existence. To meet this difficulty and to secure to Oregon the advantage of having the road built by a company of her own, the bill provided that the grantee of the land in our State should be, "Such company organized under the laws of Oregon as the State shall hereafter
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designate." By this provision our State was left to name the association or corporation that should proceed with the work and take the land. Immediate steps were taken to organize the company and on October 6th, 1866, Governor Woods, then the State execu- tive, sent a message to the Legislature notifying them that a company was about to be organized under the General Incorporation Act, to be known as the Oregon Central Railroad Company, "composed of some of the most responsible and energetic business men of the State." He suggested that through this the State avail itself of the liberal grant of land by the general government, and that to secure the construction of the first twenty miles of road the State pass a bill authorizing the payment of interest from the State Treasury on the bonds sufficient to construct the necessary preliminary section.
With this proposed State aid for getting the first section done, a company was provisionally incorporated with the following names: R. R. Thompson, S. G. Reed, J. C. Ainsworth, M. M. Melvin, George L. Woods, F. A. Chenoweth, Joel Palmer, Ed. R. Geary, S. Ellsworth, J. H. Mitchell, H. W. Corbett, B. F. Brown and T. H. Cox. Joseph Gaston was appointed secretary and was anthorized to open stock books, and solicit subscriptions. On February 20th, 1867, he published notice of incorporation. He also explained that in consequence of the California parties having chartered the avail- able ships, no iron could be brought out for his operations that year, and that arrangements for an extension of time of building their road had been made with the Oregon delegation at Washington. Stock, he said, would be solicited so soon as positive assurances were received from Eastern capitalists of investment in the securities of the company, and as soon as one-half had been subscribed a meeting would be held to elect directors according to law. This notice was generally published in the papers, and almost universally favorably commented upon.
The company was formally incorporated November 21, 1866, with the following names: J. S. Smith, J. H. Mitchell, E. D. Shattuck, Jesse Applegate, Joel Palmer, H. W. Corbett, M. M. Melvin, I. R. Moores, F. A. Chenoweth, George L. Woods, R. R. Thompson, J. C. Ainsworth, S. G. Reed, John McCraken, C. H. Lewis, B. F.
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Brown, T. H. Cox and J. Gaston. In order to get the benefit of the Land Grant of Congress, it filed its assent to the terms of the act before July 25, 1867, as provided, and was recognized as the rightful recipient of this grant, conformably to conditions, by the acting Secretary of the Interior, W. T. Otto.
After getting thus far in its way, vigorous measures were taken to obtain subscriptions of stock. The State passed a bill to pay interest on $10,000 per mile of the first hundred miles of the road built, contingent upon the completion of twenty miles. The city of Portland agreed to pay interest on $250,000 bonds for twenty years upon conditions as to building, etc. Washington county, likewise, would pay interest on $50,000; Yamhill was expecting to pay on $75,000. Private subscriptions aggregating above $25,000 in money were received, and a much greater value was donated in the shape of land from farmers and others. Values to nearly half a million dollars were thus accumulated-not, of course, available to that amount on forced sale, but substantially so in permanent possession. The route was fixed to run from Portland to Eugene on the west side of the Willamette river, passing through Washington, Yamhill, Polk and Benton Counties.
While the road was thus pushing along with determination there appeared the shadow, or double, or, as it afterwards turned out, the antagonist of the Oregon Central Railroad. This was the Oregon Central Railroad No. 2. A formidable rival of the first, it was a company organized under the same name and claiming to be the true Oregon Central Railroad, and therefore entitled to the Land Grant from the Government. It differed from the first in working for a road on the east side of the Willamette river and in the composition of its members. It may not be worth our while to give here all the particulars of the split and division in the original corporation which resulted in the formation of two companies. It is easy enough, however, to see the leading motive. There were two sides to the Willamette Valley, and each side desired a railway, and to have it must get all the State and national aid obtainable. It was a matter of course that the moment that the road was fixed for one side (Gaston having decided to locate on the side raising the largest
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subsidy), there would be an attempt to divert it to the other. It was deemed idle to expect the State or Nation to grant substantial aid for building on both sides, and hence the quarrel began for the privileges. The company as originally incorporated embraced inen on both sides of the river, but when the route was fixed for the west side-in truth, generally conformably to Barry's survey-members of the east side or those favoring it preferred to form another organization to be under their own control. The incorporators of this company- the East Side as it was popularly known-were John H. Moores, J. S. Smith, George L. Woods, E. N. Cooke, S. Ellsworth, I. R. Moores and Samuel A. Clark. It was incorporated April 22, 1867. Its first board of directors were George L. Woods, E. N. Cooke, J. H. Douthitt, I. R. Moores, T. McF. Patton, J. H. Moores, Jacob Conser, A. L. Lovejoy, F. A. Chenoweth, S. Ellsworth, S. F. Chadwick, John F. Miller, John E. Ross, J. H. D. Henderson, A. F. Hedges, S. B. Parrish and Green B. Smith. J. H. Moores was president and S. A. Clarke, secretary.
It may very well be supposed that the two rival companies thus formed, each aiming to secure a land grant worth $5,000,000 and to build a road which should not only bring millions of money to its constructors, but be a great and famous achievement and bring benefit to the whole State, and particularly to those portions traversed, began to fight each other to the death. It was war to the knife, and the knife to the hilt. The spirit of the combatants was most earnest and serious, while some of the attending circumstances were very diverting. Before the people, the west side road was able to stand on the defensive and as within the forms and requirements of law. It also maintained the position of financial integrity, and carefully eschewed and stigmatized any "wildcat " schemes. It was for the most part favored by Portland, which, being situated upon the west side of the river, rather feared the east side arrangement, as, if not actually building up a rival upon the opposite shore, at least withdrawing value from the property in the city. She was then a place of less than ten thousand people, and the injury of having the seat of value even a mile from her principal streets was thought to be considerable. Those living upon the original square mile looked with distrust and [16]
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opposition even npon "Couch's Portland," and spoke freely against the inconvenience of walking a mile to the depot-let alone a voyage across the river to Wheeler's farm, in the woods. Washington county, always warmly attached to Portland, and enjoying many favors from her close proximity, raged against the idea of being left without a road while Congressional aid was extended for a track through Clackamas and Marion. There was also much said about the inutility and the general impropriety of a dog's having two tails --- the Willamette river being averred to be good enough for the east- siders, upon whose bank their road was to be built. A broader view was expressed by some, as the Oregonian, which, seeing that a valley fifty miles wide could not and never would be accommodated by one railway, expressed a desire that bothi lines be built, speaking as follows: "We must not be understood in any way as taking sides in the controversy or supposed rivalry between the east and west side lines. We want both roads built, and the people want thein, and from the fact that there is as much need of the one as the other, we prefer to think there is or should be no rivalry between thein." (May 26, 1868).
Such pacific counsels had, of course, no influence in disposing of the real difficulty, and so long as the existence of each company depended upon getting the grant of land, and each company was using every possible form of address to fulfill the conditions, the dispute had to be carried to a conclusion-either one or the other getting the prize.
During 1867 surveys were projected on both sides. A board of directors was chosen for the west side road May 24th, composed of Captain J. C. Ainsworth, Thomas R. Cornelius, Win. T. Newby, J. B. Underwood and Joseph Gaston, of which Mr. Gaston was elected president and W. C. Whitson secretary. Mr. Hart was secured as superintendent of construction. Financial arrangements were busily canvassed, but there was no ground broken that year.
The spring of 1868 was bright and fair, and April blessed with the usual showers. The 15th day of that month was a jubilee in our little "clicking-hen of a city," as someone called it about that time, for the first shovelful of railroad earth was to be thrown that
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day. The scene of the first labors was at the then head of Fourth street, in Caruther's addition. Hither in the morning of the 15th repaired the board of directors of the Oregon Central Railroad (west side), the contractors, Messrs. Davis, Thornton & Co., and a very large and enthusiastic assemblage of citizens. At half past eleven the ceremonies began. Mr. Gaston, the president of the board, made a speech, embodying the history of the company and a statement of its franchises and finances. He outlined the general policy of the company to be to obtain enough in the way of subscriptions within the State to build the first twenty miles, and secure the government land, and upon this, and the completed work, to get loans of outside capital. He said that it was confidently believed that by the time subscription lists were closed in Portland-having referred to municipal, county and State subsidies, and to gifts of real estate by farmers and others-the required sum for the first twenty iniles would be in hand. Hiram Smith, of Portland, was loudly cheered for being the first to pay his subscription of $1,000.
Concluding his speech in the hope "that the work now to be formally inaugurated shall, in its completion, be made the servant and promoter of years of future growth, prosperity and wealth until here, upon the banks of the beautiful Willamette shall arise a city, holding the keys and being the gateway of, and hand-maid to, the commerce between the Atlantic and the Indies, shall rival Venice in its adorninent and Constantinople in its wealth," the president of the company descended to the spot where shovel and barrow were in readiness, and amid much cheering dug the first earth.
Colonel W. W. Chapman followed in a speech, setting forth the value of the road to induce immigration, and the effect it would have to stimulate the building of a branch of the Union Pacific to Portland. The financial basis he considered exceptionally good, footing up to about two and a quarter million dollars, while the cost of construction to Eugene would not exceed two millions. He spoke with great approval of the policy of the company to employ only white men-or, at least, no Chinese-as laborers, believing that the laboring population ought to be of a perinanent character, with interests common to the rest of the people. Ex-Governor A. C.
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Gibbs continued the speech-making, alluding to the rise in the value of land from $2.50 an acre to $50 under railway influence; and to the immense export of wheat that Oregon would soon arrive at.
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